Single Payer Advocates Say Bernie Sanders "Not A Fighter"

[liberalpragmatist]

I find this to be incredibly stupid and short-sighted:

Universal health care advocates called on President Obama and progressives in Congress the scrap both reform bills on Capitol Hill and "start from scratch" on a bill that creates single payer coverage for all Americans at at press conference today. They specifically aimed fire at Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who they called too weak to vote no on the Senate health care reform package they say doesn't go far enough.

Russell Mokhiber, the president of Single Payer Action, said he had "low expectations" that Sanders would vote to stop the bill his group says is nothing more than a "bailout for health insurance companies."

"We have had a history of fighters in the Senate," Mokhiber said today. "Bernie Sanders is apparently not that."

Sanders has been a vocal single payer advocate who has hinted he'll vote no on a bill that doesn't meet criteria, including a stronger public option, the single payer advocates say they support. But in the end, the single payer advocates at the press conference today said they expected he and other "Congressional progressives" will be unable or unwilling to stop the bills and call for the process to start again with the goal of creating a universal coverage system.

Link.

[cali]

1. oh for fuck's sake.

[librechik]

2. ditto

[Cleita]

3. Sigh. After all that Bernie has done to promote single payer.

He can't do it all alone, so he's going for the next best thing.

[dhpgetsit]

4. You're right.

Bernie Sanders is for single-payer and has said so repeatedly. But he is also a Senator and he knows what goes on in Congress. He knows a single-payer bill won't get passed in this session. So we should fight for all we can get now, and keep fighting until we get what we really need.

[icee2]

5. Mokhiber is right about BS

Every time I've seen Sanders on TV, changes the subject or the focus if the issue or question is about UHCare.

Sanders really is a wimp. Hes' especially pathetic when you consider that he's not even a Dem., so he has no obligation
to go along with anything the Dems. propose. Of course THEY are just as wimpy as BS, so what are you gonna do!

[Dennis Donovan]

10. You clearly DON'T know Bernie...

:eyes:

[yurbud]

6. I don't like the bill, but that's no reason to pick on Bernie

[Ian David]

7. He also left Barbara Boxer to stand alone in the senate in 2004. n/t

[StreetKnowledge]

8. What a slap in the face to Bernie.

He's the strongest of our people in the Senate. Why would people attack him? Of all the people, why him?

[Cant trust em]

9. Can we even fit anyone else under the bus?

:eyes: